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- Herausgeber: ePembaBooks
- Kategorie: Lebensstil
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022
- This edition includes the following editor's introduction: The Travels of Robert Louis Stevenson
Originally published in 1879, “Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes” is one of Robert Louis Stevenson's earliest published works and is considered a pioneering classic of outdoor literature. The book describes Robert Louis Stevenson’s “pilgrimage”, made alone, with Modestine the donkey he bought to carry his luggage for the twelve-day walk across valleys and mountains in the South of France in 1878.
Stevenson’s notebook involves reflections on the various characters he meets in villages, inns and even a monastery, and he muses on how the religious wars of the past have shaped the communities and individuals he encounters. The journey, as one would expect with Stevenson, is beautifully described – as is the character of Modestine.
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Robert Louis Stevenson
Table of contents
The Travels of Robert Louis Stevenson
TRAVELS WITH A DONKEY IN THE CEVENNES
Preface
Velay
The Donkey, the Pack, and the Pack-saddle
The Green Donkey-driver
I Have a Goad
Upper Gevaudan
A Camp in the Dark
Cheylard and Luc
Our Lady of the Snows
Father Apollinaris
The Monks
The Boarders
Upper Gevaudan (Continued)
Across the Goulet
A Night Among the Pines
The Country of the Camisards
Across the Lozere
Pont De Montvert
In the Valley of the Tarn
Florac
In the Valley of the Mimente
The Heart of the Country
The Last Day
Farewell, Modestine!
The Travels of Robert Louis Stevenson
Robert Louis Stevenson, whom many will know for masterpieces such as "Treasure Island" or "The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde," was an unrepentant traveller for much of his life. His poor health, instead of relegating him to a sedentary life, made him look for places to take care of his tuberculosis, which led him first to places like the French Riviera and then to the Pacific. However, far from staying in a sanatorium, Stevenson travelled through Europe and countless islands, voyages that he later put down in writing or that inspired him to write books such as "Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes" or "In the South Seas."
In 1888, Stevenson took possession of the yacht Casco in San Francisco with the goal of traveling to the Pacific Ocean with his entire family. The pure sea air of the southern islands had been strongly recommended to him and it was an unparalleled opportunity to travel that part of the world. Stevenson spent some time in Hawaii, where he made friends with its king, before sailing down to Tahiti, New Zealand and Samoa, passing through islands as far away as Kiribati and Abemama, and even Australia.
Throughout this journey, Stevenson continued to write fiction, such as "The Devil in the Bottle," one of the Scottish author's best stories, set in a mansion in Hawaii and featuring another of the places he visited on his travels, the leper colony of Molokai. His novel "The Master of Ballantrae" was also written at this time.
He later gave an account of his travels in "In the South Seas," a fascinating reflection of the Pacific islands, their people, customs and traditions, all accompanied by the reflections of the ever-sharp Stevenson. In fact, the author decided to stay and live on the Samoan island of Upolu, where he bought a villa and ended up becoming an important public figure, earning the esteem of the natives and the reprobation of the colonial authorities.
As a complement to the work of "In the South Seas" you can read "The Cruise of the Janet Nichol," an account of his last voyage in the Pacific, written by his wife, Fanny Van de Grift, as well as "Travel," a most interesting collection of essays on travel.
The Editor, P.C. 2022
TRAVELS WITH A DONKEY IN THE CEVENNES
Robert Louis Stevenson
Preface
My Dear Sidney Colvin,
The journey which this little book is to describe was very agreeable and fortunate for me. After an uncouth beginning, I had the best of luck to the end. But we are all travellers in what John Bunyan calls the wilderness of this world—all, too, travellers with a donkey: and the best that we find in our travels is an honest friend. He is a fortunate voyager who finds many. We travel, indeed, to find them. They are the end and the reward of life. They keep us worthy of ourselves; and when we are alone, we are only nearer to the absent.
Every book is, in an intimate sense, a circular letter to the friends of him who writes it. They alone take his meaning; they find private messages, assurances of love, and expressions of gratitude, dropped for them in every corner. The public is but a generous patron who defrays the postage. Yet though the letter is directed to all, we have an old and kindly custom of addressing it on the outside to one. Of what shall a man be proud, if he is not proud of his friends? And so, my dear Sidney Colvin, it is with pride that I sign myself affectionately yours,
R. L. S.
Velay
SOPHOCLES.
Who hath loosed the bands of the wild ass?
JOB.
The Donkey, the Pack, and the Pack-saddle
In a little place called Le Monastier, in a pleasant highland valley fifteen miles from Le Puy, I spent about a month of fine days. Monastier is notable for the making of lace, for drunkenness, for freedom of language, and for unparalleled political dissension. There are adherents of each of the four French parties—Legitimists, Orleanists, Imperialists, and Republicans—in this little mountain–town; and they all hate, loathe, decry, and calumniate each other. Except for business purposes, or to give each other the lie in a tavern brawl, they have laid aside even the civility of speech. 'Tis a mere mountain Poland. In the midst of this Babylon I found myself a rallying–point; every one was anxious to be kind and helpful to the stranger. This was not merely from the natural hospitality of mountain people, nor even from the surprise with which I was regarded as a man living of his own free will in Le Monastier, when he might just as well have lived anywhere else in this big world; it arose a good deal from my projected excursion southward through the Cevennes. A traveller of my sort was a thing hitherto unheard of in that district. I was looked upon with contempt, like a man who should project a journey to the moon, but yet with a respectful interest, like one setting forth for the inclement Pole. All were ready to help in my preparations; a crowd of sympathisers supported me at the critical moment of a bargain; not a step was taken but was heralded by glasses round and celebrated by a dinner or a breakfast.
It was already hard upon October before I was ready to set forth, and at the high altitudes over which my road lay there was no Indian summer to be looked for. I was determined, if not to camp out, at least to have the means of camping out in my possession; for there is nothing more harassing to an easy mind than the necessity of reaching shelter by dusk, and the hospitality of a village inn is not always to be reckoned sure by those who trudge on foot. A tent, above all for a solitary traveller, is troublesome to pitch, and troublesome to strike again; and even on the march it forms a conspicuous feature in your baggage. A sleeping–sack, on the other hand, is always ready—you have only to get into it; it serves a double purpose—a bed by night, a portmanteau by day; and it does not advertise your intention of camping out to every curious passer– by. This is a huge point. If a camp is not secret, it is but a troubled resting–place; you become a public character; the convivial rustic visits your bedside after an early supper; and you must sleep with one eye open, and be up before the day. I decided on a sleeping–sack; and after repeated visits to Le Puy, and a deal of high living for myself and my advisers, a sleeping–sack was designed, constructed, and triumphantly brought home.
This child of my invention was nearly six feet square, exclusive of two triangular flaps to serve as a pillow by night and as the top and bottom of the sack by day. I call it 'the sack,' but it was never a sack by more than courtesy: only a sort of long roll or sausage, green waterproof cart–cloth without and blue sheep's fur within. It was commodious as a valise, warm and dry for a bed. There was luxurious turning room for one; and at a pinch the thing might serve for two. I could bury myself in it up to the neck; for my head I trusted to a fur cap, with a hood to fold down over my ears and a band to pass under my nose like a respirator; and in case of heavy rain I proposed to make myself a little tent, or tentlet, with my waterproof coat, three stones, and a bent branch.
It will readily be conceived that I could not carry this huge package on my own, merely human, shoulders. It remained to choose a beast of burden. Now, a horse is a fine lady among animals, flighty, timid, delicate in eating, of tender health; he is too valuable and too restive to be left alone, so that you are chained to your brute as to a fellow galley–slave; a dangerous road puts him out of his wits; in short, he's an uncertain and exacting ally, and adds thirty–fold to the troubles of the voyager. What I required was something cheap and small and hardy, and of a stolid and peaceful temper; and all these requisites pointed to a donkey.
There dwelt an old man in Monastier, of rather unsound intellect according to some, much followed by street–boys, and known to fame as Father Adam. Father Adam had a cart, and to draw the cart a diminutive she–ass, not much bigger than a dog, the colour of a mouse, with a kindly eye and a determined under–jaw. There was something neat and high–bred, a quakerish elegance, about the rogue that hit my fancy on the spot. Our first interview was in Monastier market–place. To prove her good temper, one child after another was set upon her back to ride, and one after another went head over heels into the air; until a want of confidence began to reign in youthful bosoms, and the experiment was discontinued from a dearth of subjects. I was already backed by a deputation of my friends; but as if this were not enough, all the buyers and sellers came round and helped me in the bargain; and the ass and I and Father Adam were the centre of a hubbub for near half an hour. At length she passed into my service for the consideration of sixty–five francs and a glass of brandy. The sack had already cost eighty francs and two glasses of beer; so that Modestine, as I instantly baptized her, was upon all accounts the cheaper article. Indeed, that was as it should be; for she was only an appurtenance of my mattress, or self–acting bedstead on four castors.
I had a last interview with Father Adam in a billiard–room at the witching hour of dawn, when I administered the brandy. He professed himself greatly touched by the separation, and declared he had often bought white bread for the donkey when he had been content with black bread for himself; but this, according to the best authorities, must have been a flight of fancy. He had a name in the village for brutally misusing the ass; yet it is certain that he shed a tear, and the tear made a clean mark down one cheek.
By the advice of a fallacious local saddler, a leather pad was made for me with rings to fasten on my bundle; and I thoughtfully completed my kit and arranged my toilette. By way of armoury and utensils, I took a revolver, a little spirit–lamp and pan, a lantern and some halfpenny candles, a jack–knife and a large leather flask. The main cargo consisted of two entire changes of warm clothing—besides my travelling wear of country velveteen, pilot–coat, and knitted spencer—some books, and my railway–rug, which, being also in the form of a bag, made me a double castle for cold nights. The permanent larder was represented by cakes of chocolate and tins of Bologna sausage. All this, except what I carried about my person, was easily stowed into the sheepskin bag; and by good fortune I threw in my empty knapsack, rather for convenience of carriage than from any thought that I should want it on my journey. For more immediate needs I took a leg of cold mutton, a bottle of Beaujolais, an empty bottle to carry milk, an egg–beater, and a considerable quantity of black bread and white, like Father Adam, for myself and donkey, only in my scheme of things the destinations were reversed.
Monastrians, of all shades of thought in politics, had agreed in threatening me with many ludicrous misadventures, and with sudden death in many surprising forms. Cold, wolves, robbers, above all the nocturnal practical joker, were daily and eloquently forced on my attention. Yet in these vaticinations, the true, patent danger was left out. Like Christian, it was from my pack I suffered by the way. Before telling my own mishaps, let me in two words relate the lesson of my experience. If the pack is well strapped at the ends, and hung at full length—not doubled, for your life—across the pack–saddle, the traveller is safe. The saddle will certainly not fit, such is the imperfection of our transitory life; it will assuredly topple and tend to overset; but there are stones on every roadside, and a man soon learns the art of correcting any tendency to overbalance with a well–adjusted stone.
